I have MS. Several years into not being able to ride my own horses (kept at home outside, getting groomed rarely, I was too tired to ride when I finished grooming) I got so depressed about not riding I started searching for a stable where I could ride lesson horses–horses who get groomed and ridden regularly, are used to uncoordinated, clumsy riders with bad balance.
The nearest hunt seat stable to me specializes in 4-H child and teenage riders. I am by far the oldest rider at that stable, I NEED private 30 minute lessons I can afford, and it has all worked out for me. My riding teacher has learned to respect my knowledge from decades of ownership, handling, training my own, and riding, and I have found the BEST riding teacher of my whole life. This lady is GOOD, knows when and how to praise my riding (out of the blue she will tell me what I am doing RIGHT at that moment).
I told her I NEEDED a position Nazi since I do not have a proprioceptive sense and often I can’t really feel my feet and hands.
Just telling you this because getting over thinking I would need a teacher that specialized in older people to get good instruction enabled me to find the most rewarding and intellectually stimulating lesson experience in my life.
My teacher has always had adult students as well as the kids, but the kids are who bring in the majority of the money that pays for a lot of the bills.
Together my teacher and I explore the techniques I have found that I think may make me a more effective rider (lots of equitation books with lots of on-line reading). We learn from each other, I can tell her the theories, who developed the theories, why they developed their method, stuff that I tried that worked, stuff I tried that did not work, etc., etc., etc., in my 30 min. weekly lesson. A lot of riding teachers do not have the TIME to read the dusty tomes of horsemanship, but I do.
And then we figure out if I can do the stuff in spite of my body crippled in many ways from the MS. The past decade we have been exploring the proper timing of the aids. Some I can’t do so I find another way under her eagle eye so I do not accidentally hurt her horse.
Plus I CAN AFFORD HER LESSONS! (25.00 USD for 30 minutes.)
Ride On!